Traditionalists or advocates of progress? - How consumers envisage the future of supermarkets
(A2026-134156)

AUTHORS

Andrea Gröppel-Klein, Saarland University, Institute for Consumer & Behavioral Research; Marcel Nicolas Grub, Saarland University

ABSTRACT

Not every technological innovation succeeds simply because it is feasible; rather, its success or failure is determined by consumers and whether they value its benefits. Consequently, future supermarkets will not be shaped solely by technological innovations but, above all, by the preferences of consumers. This article tries to predict future developments of physical stores based on five different (qualitative and quantitative) studies, in which experts and consumers of different age groups were confronted with traditional and promising POS marketing tools and had to evaluate their usefulness. The overall results indicate that “traditional” features such as variety of products, ease of orientation, price, service, ambiance, animal welfare, and product quality are most appealing to consumers, whereas technological aspects (e.g., robot assistance, virtual/augmented reality) are considered least relevant for the supermarket of the future.